TROPICAL CONTRAST
spring summer 2014
TROPICAL CONTRAST
spring summer 2014
Brazilian born, class 1964, self-taught artist, designer, set designer, painter and sculptor, Internationally acclaimed by the museum of modern art in Sao Paulo with the greatest prize leading to an exposition in the Grand Palais of Paris in 1990. She exhibited in Paris, Rome, Venice, Sao Paulo, Fortaleza. Lived in London, New York, Paris, Sao Paulo for twenty years accumulating a wealth of experience in the arts field. After twenty years of work she came to Florence for a Masters’ in the Academy of Italian Design “Interior design and Product Design”, a way to continue to expand her knowledge. With the creative spirit
and the passion for accessories she followed a course at “Firenze-Polimoda” - Design for Bags and Accessories. While attending this course she created her own brand and was introduced to the world of luxury leather goods production . Her ideas are a flow of her art, of her tastes and traditions. An example of it is the Jangada, a type of brazilian fishing boat. Iconic object of the artist it has became her logo telling a story of simplicity, work and the strength of the fisherman that Patricia fusion with the architectonic lines of the fifties, of the construction of the modernist capital Brasilia and the a future of progress.
The leather is the base of art object for centuries. Versatile and resistant, this material is the canvas for the stylist’s creations. The mix of symbols like the boat, the wave and the dunes from her region in Brazil was concretized into the sewing effect quilted on her bags and we can see this elements all over her accessories. A polyhedric artist, face of a Brasil with ancient traditions, with an amazing story and landscapes and a new international development, that puts together all of it into the creation of an article that is born already a timeless classic. A product of brazilian creativity, luxuriously made in Italy.
THE ARTIST
The brand’s logo was born from a Patricia’s construction on the “saudade”. The word-emotion that is symbol of Brazil express a melancholic missing or a joyous memory of that we have lived. For the artist, seeing everyday the fishermen boats laying on the wood have left a footprint of an image of confort and inspiration. Emblematic vision of the ocean and the fisherman’s strength that with its simplicity makes an unique mark on the landscape of Fortaleza. The architecture is another element takes a huge part in the creative/ constructive process of Patricia. Her professional life was always the search for balance between form, light, color and material. In her past experiences she
worked as an interior designer expressing her art through the environments she created, giving life and light and her artistic view to many places such as homes, hotels and resorts. All this together with a past lived in the Brazil of Niemeyer, where cement was designed with curves and geometric forms as in the motion of the waves. The artist has always been fascinated by architecture and it remains a fundamental part of her creative repertoire. At last, to understand the artist you must understand it’s displacements. Migrating is part of an artist’s soul because ideas must move from the mind into the physical world of concrete senses. Al’Kary in libanese language means “the messenger”, and
this message that Patricia wants to deliver throught her ideas have traveled many lands, breath different airs and crossed the oceans. Like her grandparents that moved from Lebannon to Brazil, Patricia experien ced the european culture and have choosen Italy for her passion for the art. In Florence she discovered the art of the leather and the perfection that the masters artisians to them. The waves displace in the ocean, the sand is moved by the wind forming dunes and the artist’s ideas move from her creative mind to the leather in a travel of sensations, searching the beauty and the harmony and of the simplicity of the shapes and the brightness of colors
THE BRAND
Tropical Contrasts a collection based on the difference. In a world where sometimes the different still makes head turn where everything changes so fast. The artist decided to make a journey back on on the concept of positive and negative. In Japan it would be the yin and the yang, two halves that are at the same time complementary and at the same time contrary. The duo black and white is been always connected to the elegance, to the style. The black and white photographs, the mute mov-
ies, the shadow and the light. The simplicity of the colors united to the edgy shapes of the Al’Kary collection takes it out of the ordinary. The concept of the two colors are complemented by internal linen that enlightens the outside leather, with humorism and sensibility together with the gold from the hardware, plated in 24k gold, the contrast of the stitches on the quilted effect that with its shape and shadows creates the texture that is the trade-mark of the brazilain artist, not to forget the personalized metals parts that
works as small jewels and makes the collection very coherent on what it represents. The laminated silver leather plays the role of an outsider in this noir-blanc duet but it fits perfectly for gala dresses. Another nice surprise is the golden lamè effect of the sculpted leather that serves to scort with a touch of brightness any entrance of a chic lady everywhere she must go. Luxury, simplicity and purity. In colors, shapes and materials, all made to dress up all kinds of occasions of an elegant woman’s lifestyle.
THE COLLECTION
BLACK
x
+
x
+
WHITE
VICTORIA
LILI
GIGI
LODE
LOLO
ANA
LODE
VICTORIA
GIGI
LOLO
Landscapes by Jacopo Facchini Still-life by Maurizio Panicucci Art Direction by Andre Coutinho Bags by Patricia Al’Kary